Jami Munk Carter, Director of the Tooele City Library, just west of Salt Lake City, Utah. On this program, Jami shares the organic path she took into library leadership and reflects on her own vulnerability. She demonstrates the way that she genuinely connects with people, supports her staff, and selflessly gives back to the library profession – even serving as President of her state’s library association.

You will have your heart opened as she shares stories about the people who have walked into her life in the heart of the community – the library. She is thankful every day for the gift she has been given through the trust of those she helps. Give yourself the gift of listening to her reflections on the way libraries can change lives.

Full Transcript

This podcast is all about library leadership. What leaders
are doing in the field now, what up and coming leaders can look toward, a
vision from people already doing the job. We just want to share some insights
and thoughts for libraries.

We’re here with Jami Munk Carter, Director of the Tooele
City Public Library, a small community
just west of Salt Lake City. She’s also immediate past president of the Utah
Library Association. Jamie is a librarian who knocks down barriers, connects
with people, and puts her whole self into her profession. She listens, makes
people comfortable, and makes libraries a place of process learning. She supports
her staff with self-directed achievement and gives back to her profession.

In this podcast we’re going to go deeper into self-directed
achievement and how that works in her library as well as explore some of the
amazing stories that Jamie has about serving the people in her community.

Well, I am organically a librarian. This was not my plan. I
was in school and in college and had an advisor who put me in a position, I was
pre-med. He put me in a position as a TA, and one day asked me what I wanted to
do and I said, “I just can’t wait to work in a lab. I want to cure something. I
love data. I love all of these things.”

And, he stopped me and he said, I’ve literally almost seen you crawl into a cadaver showing people
things. You love to show people things. You love to teach. You love this. I
could never picture myself as a teacher.

So, diverted by life. I spent six years in HR – eight years
in HR actually, and a year as an accountant for an engineering and surveying
firm. Just briefly there, and an opening at a library came up. I had two job
offers on the table and every night woke up thinking about all the things that
could happen in that library. So, ultimately ended up taking that position and
it was entry level.

I was really excited to talk to you today about something
I’ve admired in your organization for a long time which is your process of
self-directed achievement where you let staff members decide on their own
learning goals and give them time each week to engage in those goals. Can you
tell me a little bit about how that works?

Self-Directed achievement is a mechanism that approaches
some of the gaps in our learning cultures as an organization. First of all, I
have a very strong belief that libraries are a place of learning, and not
learning, and not books and not stuff. Those things are not our products. The
process of learning is what our product is. Engaging in that process, as staff
is very very important. Engaging in a way that is the same as an individual
user that comes into the library. That it’s so important for us to stay in
touch with the vulnerability that comes with that, with some of the emotion,
with just that trepidation of not being the smartest person in the room or
believing that everyone but you knows this.

I think this is a lot of the reason why people don’t
approach people in organizations to ask for help. Why users are a little
nervous to ask because, they feel that they look vulnerable or less
intelligent, that everyone should know it.

Self-directed achievement – it’s basically a mechanism that
is an hour of learning time set aside for each staff member. That staff member
has to direct their own learning. They commit to that learning with a one-on-one
15-minute meeting with their supervisor each week. It isn’t a spontaneous,
necessarily, process.

Our staff members, we found, we’re all at different places.
We want this diverse staff. We want these things, but we designed our learning
to be a classroom setting, what we were used to. It wasn’t as effective as we
wanted it to be. It certainly feels like drinking from a fire hose to have a
staff development day once a year and then expect that everybody stays on top
of trends, learning, and understanding how that feels.

So, each staff member has an hour that they know is
dedicated and set aside for them to learn something that’s on the schedule.
They decide what they want to learn and they pursue things that are important
to them. It’s really been a culture-changing thing for our organization.

I loved the conversations after that because we had been
doing self-directed achievement for so long that it obviously was OK that we
didn’t know things. It was OK to try things and not have them work out because
there was learning at the center of all of that. We’re much more approachable
for our patrons. We’re much more approachable and understand when somebody is
frustrated with a piece of technology because we’ve been there and we have
return visits because of that.

Jamie, as past president of the Utah Library Association you
were a volunteer in this place where librarians come together for conferences
and learning, sharing, growing of ideas. Tell me about how you got involved and
what would you say to someone who might be interested in getting involved?

First of all, I’ll be very vulnerable here and let you know
that because I’m organically a librarian, I do not have my master’s degree, of
any kind, let alone in MLS. This has become very important to me and an
important piece of developing self-directed achievement, as well, with Utah
Library Association. Initially when I was approached and suggested, you really ought to run for this, immediately
imposter syndrome, from the get-go.

I really had to tough through some of that. There’s a
thought leader, Marie Forleo. She says the secret of success is to start before
you’re ready. How poignant it was for me to read that at that time. I didn’t
feel ready, nor would I ever feel ready.

Jumping in with both feet, knowing that we have support.
Trying to live what I believe, about not knowing is OK. Learning is what we do.
I have access to people who know more, who can do more. I was proud of what I
was able to accomplish during that time. I can say that because it wasn’t
simple, it wasn’t easy. And, I am so grateful for that learning opportunity
that I had, and all of the people that I was able to reach out to and learn
from as well.

What I value most about being a librarian is that it’s such
a compliment that someone that you don’t know would allow you to be part of a
search. Not a Google search, not a search the catalog, but they are merely
using our tools to get somewhere. That someone would extend that type of trust
to an individual and that, that person could be me. It’s really such a gift. Watching
somebody go through a process, learn something new, and then succeed, is one of
the most addicting things that’s happened in my life.

It’s not necessarily written for leaders. It’s a very
introspective book. The book Mindset
by Carol Dweck has been extremely influential for me. The concept that we are
both growth-minded and fixed-minded in different areas of our lives, applying
that to myself, applying that understanding to staff that I work with to assist
them to grow in ways that are meaningful to them.

In addition to our community as well, understanding how to
approach somebody. It is uncomfortable. Often I speak quite a bit about
self-directed achievement and learning cultures and in the process of learning
in general. One of the things that come up is we want a safe and comfortable
environment to learn. That’s what’s very very important to us and if we had
that we would absolutely do it. That’s what people tell me, and I contradict
part of that.

As a leader, it’s important for us to make it a safe place
to learn. That learning and failure are part of our processes. Your colleagues
also have something to do with that safety. So, it has to start with leadership
or leadership needs to adopt it. If you’re lucky enough to have a staff that is
okay with that safety.

I propose that it will never feel comfortable to learn. It
is not a place to know that you don’t know something to feel less than, to feel
a lack of something is not a comfortable place to be. What I propose to people
and what I try to live myself is that I get to use that trigger in my mind when
I’m feeling vulnerable, or when I’m feeling imposter syndrome is creeping in. I
have to recognize that, as an emotion that I can turn to – become excitement.
Because, here’s the next thing I get to be good at. Here’s the next thing I get
to learn. Here’s the next thing I get to fumble through and become a better
person for it.

Jami Munk Carter: [00:12:06] That takes some intentionality. It
takes some practice, but the idea that being comfortable, I don’t feel is a
reality, that we can really expect as a person. I worry that it becomes an
excuse because we feel safe, but not comfortable. So, we don’t do it.

Libraries are the heart of our communities, and you’ve not
only opened the doors of your library, you’ve opened the doors of your heart to
your community. Can you tell us some of the stories about the people who’ve
walked through those doors?

When I first moved to Tooele, this one of my favorite
stories, and I sometimes get a little emotional. There was a gentleman on our
library board named, Jim. He was on the board when I moved there. He was a
retired police officer from Los Angeles. He happened to be the father of
someone who was then on the city council. At that time, he had Parkinson’s
disease and used to come into the library had a little rougher time getting
around. So, of course, I liked to visit with him. He always had such a great
perspective. As a former law enforcement officer in a rough area, there was
some reality check that he gave me from time to time that I really needed. So,
we bonded. We became very close and soon his Parkinson’s got the better of him
and he passed away.

I went to his funeral and one of his children stood up and
asked if I was there, over the pulpit. Of course, I’m already sad because this
is my friend that I’ve lost. He said, We
want you to know that you are one of our dad’s favorite people and that he
requested this and we buried him with his library card. Talking about
melting in the back row.

One of my favorite people is a gal that used to come into
the library growing up through elementary school, and junior high, and is now
in high school. She has younger sisters and they’d come into the library. As
she hit her seventh-grade year, she needed to have a Job Shadow Day. She was
released from school and she needed a place to go. She felt comfortable enough
with the library to sheepishly ask me if this was a place she could do that.
She didn’t have many options within her own family to shadow someone. I felt
pretty honored. I knew that I would arm wrestle with the whole staff to spend
time with this young lady. I set the day up that she and I could start the day
together. We could have lunch together and we would close the day together and
then all of that in between, she was basically passed around with everyone so
that everyone could have a great time with her.

At the end of the day we spoke a little bit and I asked some
of her perspectives, and the conversation turned to goal setting. I spoke with
her a little bit about some of the goals that I had set, setting my goals high,
things that I didn’t think that I would be able to achieve. And, the times that
I surprised myself being able to achieve something when I’d set it to be
unachievable.

The next day she rushed in after school. Ran right past the
front desk into my office and said, I set
a goal. I set my first goal. I asked her to sit down and I was waiting for
something great. She was going to be valedictorian or she was going to try out
for the soccer team or something like that. Her goal was this, I’m going to be
the first girl in my family to graduate high school before I’m a mom.”

Trying not to get emotional when I’m looking at this person
who obviously we all care about so much. I thought how did I miss this part of
your story? What perspective I was able to gain from that experience. That
would not have been on my radar at any point in my life.

She’s a junior in high school now and she still pops her
head into my office. She’s busy these days. She pops her head into my office
and says, I still like food more than
boys. She’s a great girl and I think she’s going to achieve that goal. I’m
so proud of her. We try to read the same books together and talk about them
when we can. But, again, she’s got a life of her own now.

Our lives, every day we have the opportunity to have our
lives changed through these perspectives. It’s a gift. It is a huge gift to be
able to be there. I’m glad that there are times when I recognize I haven’t
squandered that gift being too busy doing the work.

Jamie, thank you for coming in today and sharing your stories about your time as the Utah Library Association President, about self-directed achievement for your staff, and about the stories that make all of our jobs so special as librarians. This is Adrian Herrick Juarez. You’ve been listening to Library Leadership Podcast. Thank you for listening. We’ll see you next time.

Why We Burned Our First Leadership Book, or How to Develop a Leadership Path that Holds Personal Meaning

Presenter: Adriane Herrick Jaurez

Co-Presenter : Becca Lael – Park City Library

Utah Library Association Conference

Thursday, May 16, 1:30-2:20pm

Mountain America Expo Center

How can we develop a leadership path that holds personal meaning? Inspired by interviews from the Library Leadership Podcast, a variety of strategic insights will show us how everyone can improve their leadership to personally shape their workplace, the community they serve, and the trajectory of the library profession. Attendees will learn how one library manager’s leadership path was transformed to include personal meaning, resulting in braver development.

Commencement Speaker for the Graduation of the Utah State Regional Master of Library Science ProgramFriday, January 5, 7:00pm Viridian Event Center I will be giving a commencement speech for the graduating class of Cohort 12.

Utah State History Conference
October 10th– 11th, 2017 Rio Grande Depot, 300 S. Rio Grande Street, Salt Lake City, UT Honoring the Past, Moving Into the Future: The Renovation of the Historic Park City Library that Developed a Dynamic 21st Century Library while Achieving National Historic Register Designation.

Nevada/Mountain Plains Library Association Joint ConferenceOctober 16th – 18th, 2017 Hard Rock Hotel & Casino, 50 US-50, Stateline, NV89449
Lightning-round presentation on how The Park City Library recently underwent a $9.6M library renovation that included the creation of a media lab that included a sound booth, green screen, film equipment, and other high tech amenities to foster independent media production in a ‘film-centric’ mountain town that is accessible to everyone, not just movie producers.